My review: 3.65 ⭐
After the Wedding is told in 4 parts and follows Christine and Jessica.
The prologue was promising and it pulled me right in ~ Christine was a flower girl at her Aunt Sharon’s wedding when she was 5. There was an accident that she had trouble remembering until several years later as an adult. Soon enough though, it was a bit slow going for me until somewhere in part 2, closer to the end, maybe even part 3. It had it’s up and downs with keeping me engaged throughout.
Christine and Richard Stone met on a train, fell in love and opened up one of the most successful advertising agencies in Dublin ~ Foundation Stone. They hire Jessica to be their copywriter. While Jessica is perfect for the job, Christine can’t help but feel like something is off with her. When a rumor is started on social media that Foundation Stone is having problems and is up for sale, they all scramble to stomp the rumors and avoid losing clients. Jessica just happens to have a powerful father that can help them turn their business around.
Part 2 starts off very intriguing with a teaser about Jessica. We dive more into her early life and learn lots of things about her and her father, Samuel.
The pace picked up in parts 3 & 4, but I really didn’t care for Christine too much, or Jessica, or really anyone for that matter. Actually, Stella, I did like her, and maybe Ryan too, but that’s all.
Overall, this was an okay read and I was pleased with the ending.
*Thanks to Netgalley, Bookouture and Laura Elliot for the ARC. I am voluntarily leaving my honest review*
Book blurb: Release date ~ March 24, 2022
Everyone said she was the prettiest flower girl. But now her dress lies on the floor. It’s wet and torn, her shoes are lost. ‘Where did you go?’ her daddy asks. She shakes her head. All she can remember are the red rose petals scattering like drops of blood spilling to the ground.
When Christine Lewis was a little girl, she witnessed something terrible at a wedding and buried it so deep in her memory, she managed to forget it ever happened.
Jessica Newman was a baby when she and her father came to live in an isolated cottage on the Irish island of Cullain with Margaret – the woman who loved Jessica as if she was her own. Until the day Jessica and her father left, and she never saw Margaret again.
Years later, Christine and Jessica cross paths working at the advertising agency Christine runs with her husband. These two women are about to uncover the dark secrets of their own traumatic pasts. But they have no idea that they are connected.
The shocking truth of what happened at the wedding all those years ago, and what became of Margaret, is going to blow their lives apart in more ways than each of them could ever have imagined…
A breathtaking, emotional, and suspenseful page-turner that will have you completely hooked. Fans of Lisa Jewell, Gillian Flynn and Sally Hepworth will be gripped by After the Wedding.
